By some grace of God, I did find the bloke and arrived at my new home - an apartment block conveniently situated right in the centre of town - next to the prison block. My new boss dropped by to give me the low down - he'd take me to see the golf course on Monday for lunch until then don't walk into town, don't talk to locals, don't wear or carry anything valuable and (on giving me keys to my new car), lock the doors at all times or you will be car-jacked. Excellent - think that was all the bases covered. After he left I pondered for a while about what he was proposing and came to a conclusion very quickly. Buggar that for a game of soldiers! I was not planning on spending the next 2 years of my life seeing a sanitised version of such an amazing country.
I changed into jeans, T-shirt, put 10 shillings in my back pocket in case I was mugged and walked into town. It is fair to say over the next 2 years, I was indeed mugged on more occasions than I care to mention, car-jacked at gunpoint, had such a horrific car accident that my car ended up on top of a tree, was caught in student riots, broke ribs and was hit by a very jam packed matatu. I drove my bosses crazy at work with what they saw as my unnecessary risk taking behaviour - I smiled, nodded, ignored them and just carried on doing my do...
On the flip side, most of my friends during that 2 year period were made from that 1st walk into town (you'll be pleased to know I made it past the prison block before I started befriending people!) I got chatting to a local Kenyan called Jacob; on realising I wasn't a tourist with cash loads to spend he took me to the local bar in town for a beer and a chat. 2 weeks later I was driving across Kenya to meet his family that still lived in traditional mud huts on the boarder of Uganda. I had discos by car lights with kids from the slums, I ate chicken heads and fried flies for Saturday lunch among "family", I became fluent in Swahili and spent many weekends in town sitting on the bonnets of the taxis along with all the taxi drivers staring at the most beautiful sky in the world and chatting about Arsenal (I kid you not...). I hand fed giraffe, ploughed fields by hand and ate more roadkill than was probably wise (let's not mention that bout of dysentry shall we?!)
During my time in Africa I would often be the only white person in the room, indeed I would often be the only white person for miles - standing out as much as I did that first day at the airport. I once commented to my friend Jacob if it bothered him that I was white... he didn't laugh or deny but instead just looked really confused and said "White is just one of the colours we all come in, a bit like coffee".
I came back from Africa nearly 14 years ago now, and while I never did learn golf and never achieved the "Employee of the Month Award" that experience - that I could only have ever gained through work - has had such a profound effect on me personally and today is strongly influencing how I raise my girls. Not to ignore, gloss over or pretend that people aren't different; those differences are there for whatever reason and by understanding, accepting, learning and looking beyond the "2 week touristy view" we often learn more about ourselves. And if they ever ask those blunt childlike questions about peoples' differences I can smile sweetly and in the essence of Jacob's words simply say "Sweetheart, its a bit like coffee, comes in many shapes and forms but its all good"
So one day I will take my girls back to Kenya, I will introduce them to my friends of old, the people, the children, the wildlife and one of the most beautiful skies in the world although I may have to hold off on that fried fly thing...
No comments:
Post a Comment